The Harley-Davidson motorcycle company has arranged a deal with the film school at the University of California-Santa Barbara that recruits students as cheap labor to make Harley ads in the form of "short sponsored videos for online media or for downloading to other digital media platforms such as cell phones, iPods, and PDAs." Under the terms of the "partnership," students submit proposals to Harley-Davidson, describing the type of video they plan to make. If approved, the company pays a stipend of up to $1,200 for each proposal, and a prize of $5,000 to the winner. Harley then owns all rights to the videos. The university's website explains the project as follows: "This class will also address the significance of direct internet sales on sites such as eBay, and the role of the blogosphere, webcasting, podcasting, new user nets such as Craig’s List, among many others on the way young people both consume and produce media content. Today the YouTube 'viral video' phenomenon is challenging the dominant model of top-down, organization-driven approaches to getting messages communicated in favor of more spontaneous, organic and bottom-up strategies driven by consumers themselves."

CMD's Congresspedia Managing Editor Conor Kenny authored the cover story for the May issue of In These Times. Titled "Hello, I'm a Democrat," the article addresses the phenomenon of the netroots, or internet-based activists. "While they are engaged to one degree or another in the national-level actions and organizations, many of the most committed and involved activists are busy transforming the Democratic Party from the ground up." Conor also covers the commitment of the netroots to not assume that traditionally Republican areas are outside of the reach of this newly envisioned Democratic Party. "Whether inspired by Dean or the other way around, one of the activists' central tenets is the need to build the party in red areas abandoned by the state parties and, in the case of the DNC, entire states." The article also includes four profiles of netroots activists.